Complete Poetical Works by Bret Harte Part 27

Thou seest the white seas strike their tents, O Warder of two continents!

And, scornful of the peace that flies Thy angry winds and sullen skies,

Thou drawest all things, small, or great, To thee, beside the Western Gate.

O lion's whelp, that hidest fast In jungle growth of spire and mast!

I know thy cunning and thy greed, Thy hard high l.u.s.t and willful deed,

And all thy glory loves to tell Of specious gifts material.

Drop down, O Fleecy Fog, and hide Her skeptic sneer and all her pride!

Wrap her, O Fog, in gown and hood Of her Franciscan Brotherhood.

Hide me her faults, her sin and blame; With thy gray mantle cloak her shame!

So shall she, cowled, sit and pray Till morning bears her sins away.

Then rise, O Fleecy Fog, and raise The glory of her coming days;

Be as the cloud that flecks the seas Above her smoky argosies;

When forms familiar shall give place To stranger speech and newer face;

When all her throes and anxious fears Lie hushed in the repose of years;

When Art shall raise and Culture lift The sensual joys and meaner thrift,

And all fulfilled the vision we Who watch and wait shall never see;

Who, in the morning of her race, Toiled fair or meanly in our place,

But, yielding to the common lot, Lie unrecorded and forgot.

THE MOUNTAIN HEART'S-EASE

By scattered rocks and turbid waters shifting, By furrowed glade and dell, To feverish men thy calm, sweet face uplifting, Thou stayest them to tell

The delicate thought that cannot find expression, For ruder speech too fair, That, like thy petals, trembles in possession, And scatters on the air.

The miner pauses in his rugged labor, And, leaning on his spade, Laughingly calls unto his comrade-neighbor To see thy charms displayed.

But in his eyes a mist unwonted rises, And for a moment clear Some sweet home face his foolish thought surprises, And pa.s.ses in a tear,--

Some boyish vision of his Eastern village, Of uneventful toil, Where golden harvests followed quiet tillage Above a peaceful soil.

One moment only; for the pick, uplifting, Through root and fibre cleaves, And on the muddy current slowly drifting Are swept by bruised leaves.

And yet, O poet, in thy homely fashion, Thy work thou dost fulfill, For on the turbid current of his pa.s.sion Thy face is shining still!

GRIZZLY.

Coward,--of heroic size, In whose lazy muscles lies Strength we fear and yet despise; Savage,--whose relentless tusks Are content with acorn husks; Robber,--whose exploits ne'er soared O'er the bee's or squirrel's h.o.a.rd; Whiskered chin and feeble nose, Claws of steel on baby toes,-- Here, in solitude and shade, Shambling, shuffling plantigrade, Be thy courses undismayed!

Here, where Nature makes thy bed, Let thy rude, half-human tread Point to hidden Indian springs, Lost in ferns and fragrant gra.s.ses, Hovered o'er by timid wings, Where the wood-duck lightly pa.s.ses, Where the wild bee holds her sweets,-- Epicurean retreats, Fit for thee, and better than Fearful spoils of dangerous man.

In thy fat-jowled deviltry Friar Tuck shall live in thee; Thou mayst levy t.i.the and dole; Thou shalt spread the woodland cheer, From the pilgrim taking toll; Match thy cunning with his fear; Eat, and drink, and have thy fill; Yet remain an outlaw still!

MADRONO

Captain of the Western wood, Thou that apest Robin Hood!

Green above thy scarlet hose, How thy velvet mantle shows!

Never tree like thee arrayed, O thou gallant of the glade!

When the fervid August sun Scorches all it looks upon, And the balsam of the pine Drips from stem to needle fine, Round thy compact shade arranged, Not a leaf of thee is changed!

When the yellow autumn sun Saddens all it looks upon, Spreads its sackcloth on the hills, Strews its ashes in the rills, Thou thy scarlet hose dost doff, And in limbs of purest buff Challengest the sombre glade For a sylvan masquerade.

Where, oh, where, shall he begin Who would paint thee, Harlequin?

With thy waxen burnished leaf, With thy branches' red relief, With thy polytinted fruit,-- In thy spring or autumn suit,-- Where begin, and oh, where end, Thou whose charms all art transcend?

COYOTE

Blown out of the prairie in twilight and dew, Half bold and half timid, yet lazy all through; Loath ever to leave, and yet fearful to stay, He limps in the clearing, an outcast in gray.

A shade on the stubble, a ghost by the wall, Now leaping, now limping, now risking a fall, Lop-eared and large-jointed, but ever alway A thoroughly vagabond outcast in gray.

Here, Carlo, old fellow,--he's one of your kind,-- Go, seek him, and bring him in out of the wind.

What! snarling, my Carlo! So even dogs may Deny their own kin in the outcast in gray.

Well, take what you will,--though it be on the sly, Marauding or begging,--I shall not ask why, But will call it a dole, just to help on his way A four-footed friar in orders of gray!

TO A SEA-BIRD